Mo Carson

Here is an interesting thought - you know how we h...

Here is an interesting thought - you know how we hear about this place or that place deciding not to teach evolution in school or to give equal weight to the creation theory? I, for one, am glad about this. Not because I don't believe in evolution - I think it is one of the most important concepts to understand. No, I am glad because we will need more and more people to work in WalMart and fast food places in the future and these kids that come out of these schools are going to be the ones to fill those jobs. Plus it will mean less competition for my son when it comes to getting in to good schools.

It is not so much that these kids grow up not believing in evolution that means that they will end up in low paying jobs but that they will miss an understanding of the scientific method. If you believe that the theory of creation and the theory of evolution are on par then how will you ever be able analyze complex problems and make well informed decisions.

This is why I cheer on those school districts that discuss doing away with the teaching of evolution. Lets hope more schools embrace this idea.

Second post is about travel, I thought I would lis...

Second post is about travel, I thought I would list some of the places that I have been that I am really glad I have been able to see so far in my life. Not in any paticular order:

The Alhambra in Spain
Machu Picchu in Peru
Angkor Wat and the surrounding temples in Cambodia
The mud Mosque in Dejenne Mali
The Taj Mahal in Agar India
The cave paintings in Sigiriya Sri Lanka
Mountain gorillas in Mgahinga Uganda
The Grand Canyon
The northern lights
Samburu national park in Kenya
Borobudur temple in Indonesia
Tikal Guatemala
The big Buddha at Nara Japan

I guess there is a theme here, I love temples or old places that were very hard to build at the time. There are a lot of other places I am really glad to have visited but these are sights that have really stuck with me. Still a lot to see though.

I did some analysis of the top rated music in my I...

I did some analysis of the top rated music in my Itunes. I have had an Ipod for a little over a year now and have added about 5800 songs to it. Most are from CD, only about a hundred purchased from I tunes. I absolutely love my Ipod, I play it in the car (no more radio for me), I have a Bose player in my office and I listen to it on all my airplane trips. I think it is a great product. Anyway, back to the analysis. These are how my top rated looks by Genre:

Genre Number of Songs Hours
Jazz 331 38.5
World 150 15.4
Rock 141 13.4
Blues 77 6.6
Country 41 2.7
R&B 10 0.6
Reggae 2 0.2
Total 752 77.4

Jazz is understated as a lot of the Latin jazz shows up in world music. Country includes folk.

Here are the top 15 artists (by song count):

Artist Number of Songs Hours
Miles Davis 33 4.8
John Coltrane 26 2.7
Neil Young 23 2.1
Stan Getz 22 2.3
Roy Hargrove 18 1.9
Charlie Parker 15 1.2
Pink Floyd 13 2.2
Cal Tjader 12 0.9
Oscar Peterson 12 1.9
Sonny Rollins 12 1.3
Art Blakey 10 1.2
Bob Dylan 10 0.8
Poncho Sanchez 10 1
Tito Puente 10 1.1

What stuns me is how little of the music that I loved so much when I was younger makes to the top rated list. I suppose this is true for everyone. 20 years ago I could not have named a jazz musician and had no clue what was going on in world music. Only Neil Young, Pink Floyd and Bob Dylan still come out on top. Some of the other bands from that time that are further down the list are Ten Years After, Canned Heat, Paul Butterfield and Boz Skaggs.

Canned Heat is interesting in that I was never a big fan growing up but have come to like them a lot in the last couple of years. I bought a blues compilation album that had a song of theirs called Bullfrog blues that is great. I then bought a 2 disk CD called Boogie House tapes that is also great.

I will have more to say about music later.

Hello

Interesting stuff will come later, for now just getting started. Some of the items I will publish soon relate to music, favorite places to visit, some politics and some business related items.